hiddengrotto @ 2007-12-25T15:51:00

2007-12-25T20:51:55Z

I've returned to the States for Christmas. And to go back to school.

I'm experiencing horrible culture shock, jetlag, and general "missing France"-ness.

hiddengrotto @ 2007-11-11T08:46:00

2007-11-11T07:53:01Z

huh. it's been over a year since i've updated this.

here's the low-down. i live in france now. maybe sometime soon i'll give a fuller update?

{shrug}

hiddengrotto @ 2006-10-12T01:28:00

2006-10-12T01:29:07Z

Does anybody still read this?

hiddengrotto @ 2006-05-29T20:14:00

2006-05-30T03:17:10Z

Oh dear. Bevan has turned emo.

hiddengrotto @ 2006-05-26T10:54:00

2006-05-26T17:55:04Z

plans are being made for my glorious return to Ohio.

pulling out of Redondo Beach on July 24th. woo.

i promise once i'm back in ohio, i'll start to update again.

promise and swear.

hiddengrotto @ 2006-02-04T11:10:00

2006-02-04T19:13:35Z

Warning: This update is not dial-up friendly

Bevan and Kyle Conquer America

DAY ONE

It started as a normal, ordinary day. Well, except not at all. It was 6:30 in the morning when we left Dayton, Ohio. And we had an extraordinary lightning storm to entertain us as we left the place that I have called home.

It rained. A lot. We reached the Indiana border... and it continued to rain. And we took pictures of each other at the WELCOME TO INDIANA sign... but for some reason they didn't get developed. Just use your imagination.

Indiana was pretty much normal. And rainy. Really rainy. Kyle curled up and fell asleep for a little while. We passed by Indianapolis... been there done that before. We finally hit... ILLINOIS

See that gray sky?! Yeah. Anyway. Kyle took over the driving for all of Illinois. He handled Gertrude very well... treated her like she was his own. At some point down the road we ran into...

Cool, eh? Still grey skies. The best part of Illinois, though, was the music. We were playing Sufjan Stevens' Come On And Feel The Illinoise throughout the entire state. Eventually, we made it to MISSOURI. A very snowy St. Louis greeted us...

(the second one is supposed to be of the WELCOME TO MISSOURI sign. Ah well.)

I was determined to see the St. Louis Zoo. We went there. In near blizzard conditions. And we roamed around, seeing no animals because, once again, it was reeeallly snowing. Didn't mean we didn't have fun though!

And then we did see... THE PENGUINS!

We then drove from the Zoo over to my friend Stephanie's house. Mind you, I haven't seen Stephanie in probably 6 years. It was wonderful to get to spend some time with her :)

And then back on the road. And still very grey skied... until... we got back on the freeway. That's when everything changed. We saw the line of the cold front... a straight line in the sky with gray clouds on one side and blue sky on the other. As we drove down the Missouri freeway, we were amazed at the beauty we were suddenly seeing. And then, the sun set:

We settled into a nice hotel in Springfield, Missouri and had dinner at a local sports bar. We considered doing some karaoke, but thought better of it and hit the sack. And so ended DAY ONE.

DAY TWO

We woke up to the sound of a telephone as the hotel gave us our wake up call. Together, we went down to enjoy our free full breakfast. Then back on the road. As we approached Oklahoma, we were faced with quite a dilemma. Do we go a mile out of our way so that we can get our pictures at the KANSAS state line? Or do we just keep on truckin:

Will you just LOOK at that SKY! We hopped back on the interstate and another mile down the road encoutered OKLAHOMA.

Now contrary to popular belief, Oklahoma was really quiet an awesome state. Yes, it was very flat... but it was beautiful in its own way. Plus... uh... LOOK AT THE SKY! Outside of Tulsa, we discovered something wonderful indeed. That's right folks... we found the world's largest McDonald's. The sucker spanned the entire freeway... craziness.

(that second picture, of course, being taken from inside the world's largest McDonald's.)

Back on the road again. There was a lot of "back on the road" during this trip. We were on a mission. Seeing sites and taking names, but definitely had our goal in mind. So here's pretty much what Oklahoma looked like for the majority of our time there...

It really was gorgeous. Eventually, we hit TEXAS:

Now Texas was a big surprise for me. I assumed that I would hate it... because... I mean... it's Texas! I'm not the kind of person that likes "Texas". But I really fell in love with the place. I can't explain it... so don't expect me to. Right after the Texas border, we stopped for a gas fill up in little town called "Shamrock". Kyle did a little jig with a leprechaun... I just goosed the little guy.

Like I said... I really really liked Texas. And then the sky got kinda cloudy... but not bad cloudy. Really really really cool cloudy. And we saw this magnificent little thing...

Isn't that incredible?! Yeah. I thought so. We stopped at a steak house in Amarillo (steak in Texas... whoda thunk it.) And learned that:

JOHN WAYNE IS HUGE IN TEXAS.

So after an incredible steak, we're once again back on the road. We both took pictures at the NEW MEXICO sign, but we don't show up in either of them because of the whole it being night thing.

An hour-ish into New Mexico we reached the end of Day Two. A quaint little motel in Santa Rosa housed us. Mmmm. Sleep is nice.

DAY THREE

The day started out with a lousy "continental breakfast". It was kinda pathetic, but whatever. Free food is better than no food. Then we began the day. We actually got out of the hotel by like 6:45 AM, because we wanted to see the New Mexico sunrise while we were on the road. We pulled over and stopped and watched the sun rise. And it was gorgeous.

New Mexico was a lot of desert... pretty desert. And then all of a sudden...

MOUNTAINS ON THE HORIZON. They're kinda small in that picture, but they were really big looking in person. Aren't the shadows of Ky and I nifty in that? I like it.

We got to about 30 minutes outside of Albuquerque when we decided to stop for some McDonald's grub. That's when we realized it. I had left my wallet sitting in the hotel room. EEK! I called the hotel and they were able to locate it. But what did this mean? It meant we had to drive 90 miles back to Santa Rosa to pick it up. Then 90 miles to get back to where we were. 180 miles out of the way total. Thus. Bevan equals stupid idiot.

OK. We finally make it back to Albuquerque-area... after many rousing rounds of "The Alphabet Game". Kyle won, by the way. But I'm convinced he was cheating. But we're driving through downtown Albuquerque when we see... a giant sofa in the middle of the road. We luckily avoided it and a horrible accident. But still... weird.

You'll notice that there aren't a whole lot of pictures for day three yet. Well, that's because Kyle and I were so blasted by the beauty of the New Mexico desert that we kinda forgot to take pictures. Lots of mesas. Lots of rock sculptures. Just!Plain!Gorgeous! Here's one picture, but this is the best I can do for you. Sorry!

We stopped right before the Arizona border in Gallup to fill up the tank. It was a cool little town that looked like it had been trapped in the past:

Then we hit ARIZONA

And the first thing we saw once past the Arizona border?

Arizona was once again most deserts, with some mountains sprinkled around ever once in a while. Pretty gorgeous.

As we neared the Grand Canyon... you know what, this isn't a story I can really write, per se. It's something that I need to verbally tell you. (Or for those of you who know Kyle, have him tell you...). Suffice it to say that Gertrude should have been covered in snow... but the clouds were parting and there was blue sky above us... and grey clouds on either side of us. That's the basic gist of the story. And here's a picture to prove it:

So then we got to the Grand Canyon and saw it's majesty. So freakin incredible. Just plain mind blowing. We settled into the Red Feather Lodge about a mile and a half south of the canyon and had a wonderful evening.

DAY FOUR

We woke up very early, knowing full well that the last leg of our journey was lying ahead of us. But we weren't gonna tackle that last leg until we saw the sun rise over the Canyon. Ahhhhhh. It was about three degrees (and negative windchill) and I'm pretty sure that both of us were nearing frostbite. But it was so worth it!

Man. I was just plain blown away. So then we hopped back into the car and began the last leg of our quest. One of the coolest things about driving through the desert areas was that you could look out and see for miles. Several times, we noticed that we could see the entire length of trains as the went on their ways off in the distance:

After three hours of the Arizona landscape, we finally saw...

After a lackluster lunch at a Jack in the Box in Needles, CA, we hit the Mojave Desert.

Most of California was consumed by this desert. And it was very peaceful and calm and sublime. We started noticing the cacti that lined the road and dotted the lush desert lands. And all was good as we cruised down the freeway listening to the Red Hot Chili Peppers (take a guess at which album ).

Finally, we hit the mountains of San Bernardino. All of a sudden, we were surrounded by grass and trees and mountains and beauty. As if we hadn't seen enough beauty already! Then it happened. We hit Orange County and started getting on those famous freeways. The 605, the 110 (as featured in the movie Speed), the 405, the 710. We got a little lost, but through cellphone coaching from my uncle were able to find our way to Redondo Beach. Check out some of the siets from my new neighborhood!

And take a look at my new house.

There's a lemon tree in my backyard... and Kyle poked it.

We cruised around, dodging the crazy drivers and admiring all the palm trees and the fast food places that we'd never heard of before...

And... yes... could it be?! THE PACIFIC OCEAN!

A perfect ending to a perfect trip? I'd give that a resounding YES!

(if anybody wants any of these pics in higher resolution... just let me know. I've got them all on my computer in all their glory).

Love you!